Thursday, June 13, 2013

PCORI Hopes Patient-Proposed Research Leads to Patient-Centered Care

A web-based prototype crowdsourcing platform that lets users propose and support health-related research topics got a boost from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) last week with a $40,000 top prize in the PCORI Challenge.

WellSpringboard, being developed by researchers from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, is designed to enable patients to propose, endorse, and pledge funds for research topics. Researchers then would apply for the funding to conduct studies on those topics.

Other prize winners in the PCORI Challenge included these:

ACTONNECT allows users to search patient forums and other sites for health information and share the results graphically.

ResearchMatch is a national registry of potential study volunteers and researchers.